The Interfaith Pastor

Tag: multifaith

  • A Question of Identity

    imagesWay back in the 1980s, when I was doing my year of internship in a large Lutheran church, I had the opportunity to observe my supervisor conduct a rehearsal for a Jewish-Christian wedding. When the wedding party arrived, someone reminded my supervisor that he had agreed to remove the Paschal candle from the front of the church.

    I was appalled. I remember thinking, “But this is a Christian church; this is who we are. We shouldn’t deny that!” I never mentioned it to my supervisor and missed an opportunity to discuss the issue. At the time, I was forming my own pastoral identity, steeped in “correct” theological beliefs and church practices, so I may not have been open to a more expansive view at that time.

    Decades later, however, I look back and see the question of identity as a crucial one with which the church of today must wrestle. It’s part of both the interfaith and intrafaith landscapes. And it is an ongoing process! Even now, when officiating at a wedding at the chapel at the Interfaith Center at the Presidio, I flinch a little when we pull the drapes over the cross in the front of the church. It’s like telling Jesus to turn his back for a little while.

    Identity is important. How can I make my way in the world if I don’t know who I am? If I’m confused or if I allow myself to be swayed by someone with a stronger sense of self, I risk losing myself completely. Boundaries are a big part of identity. Part of an infant’s growth process is discovering where she ends and her mother and others begin. We’ve learned that poor boundaries lead to all kinds of dysfunction in individuals, families and organizations. So it is no wonder we become alarmed when we feel that our identity as Christians has been eroded. We feel threatened, under attack from all directions – secularism, science, a new generation that does not find the same meaning in the institutions in which we were raised.

    And then there’s the reality of religious diversity. Just look at the panicked responses to “the war on Christmas.” My Facebook page this past season was filled with challenges to dare to say “Merry Christmas” instead of “Happy Holidays.”

    This anxiety isn’t unique to Christianity. Sylvia Boorstein, who is Jewish, reflects on the popularity of Buddhism:
    “. . . I think the alarm people express about Buddhism has more to do with instinctive fears about tribal survival than philosophical error. . . Doing an action that another group does . . . arouses concern. I think it’s the natural, self-protective, genetic response of tribes.” [1]

    Our Christian tribe is anxious. We lament the decline in membership in our churches and try to figure out how to attract new people. We worry about how to pay for the expenses of the staff, buildings and programs we’ve come to expect as necessary parts of being “church.” We live in survival mode and when we can no longer afford these perceived necessities, we count ourselves as failures.

    For many in the Church, interfaith encounter seems superfluous or downright threatening. However, I believe that our tribe will be in trouble, not because of all the other tribes out there, but because we will not have figured out who we are in the midst of them. In family systems terms: we must be self-differentiated while remaining connected. Just as this is the way to health in personal relationships and families, so it is with the Church.

     

    [1] Boorstein Sylvia. That’s Funny, You Don’t Look Buddhist: On Being a Faithful Jew and a Passionate Buddhist. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1997, 135-6.

     

     

     

  • Wheaton College: an Intra-faith Controversy

    If you haven’t been following the news from Wheaton College, an evangelical college in Wheaton, Illinois, the story is this:
    In December, Larycia Hawkins, a tenured associate professor of political science at Wheaton since 2007, decided to show solidarity with Muslims by wearing a hijab and stating that Muslims and Christians “worship the same God.”

    The college almost immediately placed her on paid administrative leave. They said that this would give them time to explore questions regarding the theological implications of her recent public statements.  On January 5, they issued a Notice of Recommendation to Initiate Termination-for-Cause Proceedings.

    Since then, there’s been a firestorm of protest against Wheaton’s action. Numerous petitions calling for the reinstatement of Dr. Hawkins (including moveon.org and change.org) have been circulating. Christian clergy of various denominations and leaders from other religious traditions have rallied in support.

    Which is all well and good.

    However, what we have here is a classic example of our need for an intrafaith conversation.  For some Christians, the statement that Muslims and Christians “worship the same God” poses no theological problems. For others, it’s an impossible statement to make. Members of each group consider themselves to be faithful Christians. Although I don’t know any of them, I seriously doubt that the administrators of Wheaton College are bigots. Dr. Hawkins herself has written on her Facebook page, “Friends, Embodied Solidarity is not demonizing others in defense of me” and asks for “prayers and actions that emanate love, grace, peace, and if necessary, forgiveness.”

    We are confronted with the question raised by Marjorie Suchoki in Divinity and Diversity: “How do Christians deal with this phenomenon (religious pluralism)? Our Christian past has traditionally taught us that there is only one way to God, and that is through Christ. But we are uneasy. Our neighborliness teaches us that these others are good and decent people, good neighbors, or loved family members! Surely God is with them as well as with us. Our hearts reach out, but our intellectual understanding draws back. We have been given little theological foundation for affirming these others – and consequently we wonder if our feelings of acceptance are perhaps against the will of God, who has uniquely revealed to us just what is required for salvation.”1

    There are a number of ways to answer the question. Within our congregations, we’ll find exclusivists, inclusivists, and pluralists of various stripes – all faithful Christians. How will we help them to listen to one another, respect one another, and come to some agreements of how we will love and work together? 

    As Kristin Johnston Largen of the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg has written: “. . .issues of Christology cannot be avoided in an interreligious conversation that professes to take Christian faith claims seriously.”2

    We should be taking the theological position of Wheaton College seriously. We should be taking the theological positions of Dr. Hawkins and her supporters seriously. Petitions won’t solve the underlying problem. Only our intrafaith work will do that.

     

    [1] Suchocki, Marjorie, Divinity & Diversity: A Christian Affirmation of Religious Pluralism, 9.

    [2] Largen, Kristin Johnston, Finding God Among Our Neighbors, Neighbors: An Interfaith Systematic Theology, Fortress Press, 2013, 137.

     

     

     

     

  • The Intra-faith Conversation: In Memory of Elsie

    Elsie LearyI’m launching this new blog as a way to begin an intrafaith conversation (yes, I said intrafaith, spellcheck).  For over 10 years now, I have been convinced of the necessity of taking seriously the questions that arise from our interfaith encounters.

    One of the defining moments that launched me on this  quest was a conversation with Elsie, a member of the congregation I was serving at the time.

    In the days after 9/11, our adult forum wanted to study the world’s religions and they decided on Hinduism as their first venture into an interfaith encounter. In light of the fact that we would be looking at another tradition solely through our own lenses, I asked the group if they would be open to inviting a Hindu guest to one of our sessions, someone who was willing to share her story as well as answer any questions. Their answer was an enthusiastic “yes” and I invited a Hindu woman who was active in interfaith activities to come to our next meeting. The visit went well. The Christian participants were welcoming and respectful. They asked insightful questions.

    However, after the session one of the participants, Elsie, asked if she could stay and talk about something that was bothering her. She began by saying how much she was enjoying the study. She had appreciated meeting our guest and hearing her personal story. But she had a big concern. If she accepted the Hindu path as equal to Christianity, she said, “I’m worried that I’m betraying Jesus.”

    Elsie had presented me with both a pastoral and a theological quandry. And so my venture into the intrafaith conversation began. It led to enrolling in the Pacific School of Religion in Berkeley (part of the Graduate Theological Union) and getting a Doctor of Ministry degree in 2005. While my thesis is entitled Crossing Over and Coming Back: What Does It Mean to Be a Christian in an Interfaith World, I have always referred to my work as The Elsie Project. Elsie died in 2007 and when my book on this subject is published, it will be dedicated to her. I will always be grateful to her.

    And so, I hope this might be a beginning to an ongoing discussion. To get us started, a few words about the difference between interfaith and intrafaith. The most concise explication I’ve found comes from GTU professor Judith Berling’s book Understanding Other Worlds: A Guide for Interreligious Education. While geared towards the academic setting, it’s also valuable for our purposes.

    She describes the two poles of the interreligious learning process as:
    1) understanding another religion faithfully (this is interfaith), and
    2) reappropriating Christian tradition in light of new understandings and relationships (this is intrafaith).

    John Dunne, in The Way of All the Earth, goes even deeper: “What seems to be occurring is a phenomenon we might call ‘passing over,’ passing from one culture to another, from one way of life to another, from one religion to another. Passing over is a shifting of standpoint, a going over to the standpoint of another culture, another way of life, another religion. (interfaith)

    “It is followed by an equal and opposite process we might call ‘coming back,’ coming back with new insight to one’s own culture, one’s own way of life, one’s own religion.” (intrafaith)

    I am in complete agreement with Dunne’s assessment: “Passing over and coming back . . . is the spiritual adventure of our time.”

    I hope that many of you will follow this blog and join in the adventure.